What is on the PE Environmental exam?

The PE Environmental exam is a year-round, computer-based test with 80 questions, and exam time is 8 hours inside a 9-hour appointment. Specifications effective beginning April 2026 cover six knowledge areas: water, solid and hazardous waste, sustainability, air, site assessment and remediation, and environmental and occupational health. The exam uses SI and U.S. Customary units, is closed book, and gives you an electronic reference.

How the exam day is timed

The appointment is 9 hours: 2 minutes for the nondisclosure agreement, 8 minutes for the tutorial, and 8 hours for the exam, with a 50-minute scheduled break included. Eight hours for 80 questions works out to 6 minutes per question on average, though a short item will take less time and a multi-step calculation can take more.

The PE exam fee is $400 per attempt, paid to NCEES, and PE Structural is priced per section.

How many questions are in each knowledge area?

Each knowledge area has a published range under the specification effective April 2026, and your form draws from those ranges.

If you add the low end of each range, you get 70 of the 80 questions. Each PE Civil specification does this too: the low ends total 70, and the remaining questions lift some areas toward their high ends. We suggest you spend the most study time on water, then on air and on site assessment and remediation, then on solid and hazardous waste, with a shorter block on sustainability and on environmental and occupational health. The 12-week PE study plan is one way to place that work on a calendar. That weighting is our suggestion, not an NCEES rule.

What each knowledge area covers

The headings below are the official labels. The descriptions say what kinds of problems sit in each band.

Water

Water is 19-29 questions, the widest band, and problems use flow and fluid behavior, surface and groundwater hydrology, chemistry, biology and microbiology, contaminant movement, sampling, monitoring, and project management. Drinking-water items cover supply sources, treatment choices and operations, distribution, and residuals. Wastewater items cover cutting pollution at the source, treatment and operations, collection, residuals, and reuse. Stormwater and water-resources items cover runoff pollution, watershed planning, and stormwater controls.

Solid and Hazardous Waste

This area is 11-17 questions, and you apply chemistry, contaminant transport, hydrology and geology, mass and energy balances, sampling, risk, codes and guidelines, reduction and recycling, and project management. Municipal and industrial solid waste items ask how waste is stored, collected, and moved, which treatment or disposal method fits, and how the system is managed. Hazardous, medical, and radioactive waste is part of the same area and is judged on those same handling, treatment, disposal, and management decisions.

Sustainability

Sustainability is 7-11 questions, and resource conservation covers energy, renewable and nonrenewable sources, materials, and life-cycle analysis. Resilience covers how vulnerable the infrastructure is, which climate impacts matter, and whether redundancy keeps the system reliable. We suggest you still practice a few life-cycle comparisons and reliability judgments so this smaller band is familiar on exam day.

Air

Air is 13-20 questions, and you may sample and measure emissions, use chemistry and atmospheric science, and follow how pollutants move, under the codes, standards, regulations, and guidelines that apply. Control problems ask you to identify sources, characterize emissions, build an inventory, select a treatment or control technology, and prevent or reduce pollution. Project management can be part of the same item.

Site Assessment and Remediation

This area is also 13-20 questions, and site assessment includes investigating the property, judging risk, describing how contaminants move, and managing the investigation. Remediation asks you to compare cleanup options, select and run a technology, support the choice with a feasibility study, and keep the project organized.

Environmental and Occupational Health

The range is 7-11 questions, and compliance covers health and security requirements, emergency plans, incident response, and the codes, standards, regulations, and guidelines that set those duties. Exposure work covers environmental health, occupational health, exposure assessments, and the project management around that work.

Which reference can you use?

The exam is closed book, and the electronic reference is the PE Environmental Reference Handbook, version 2.0, a 222-page PDF that NCEES first posted in October 2025. Study from that version so the layout is familiar when the exam clock is running.

The Examinee Guide table lists no design standards for PE Environmental, while PE Civil does use design standards. See PE references and design standards for how supplied references and design standards are handled on PE exams.

PE Environmental pass rates

NCEES last updated PE Environmental pass rates in July 2026: 73% of 415 first-time examinees passed, and 54% of 118 repeat examinees passed, with the two groups listed separately. If your exam date is well after that update, check the NCEES table again. Other disciplines are collected on the PE exam pass rate page.

How PE Environmental differs from PE Civil water resources

NCEES offers both this exam and the PE Civil Water Resources and Environmental exam, and the outlines differ. The civil specification is effective April 2024 and has twelve knowledge areas, and your licensing board decides which exam it will accept for your application.

The civil exam also scores project planning (4-6 questions), soil mechanics (3-5), materials (4-6), and project sitework (9-14). Sitework covers grading and earthwork, construction layout, erosion and sediment control, effects on nearby facilities, safety, basic horizontal and vertical curves, retaining walls, and construction methods.

Water topics on the civil exam are split into more bands: analysis and design is 6-9 questions and stays on mass balance, hydraulic and solids loading, and flow measurement, while Hydraulics-Closed Conduit and Hydraulics-Open Channel are each 7-11 questions. Hydrology is 8-12, groundwater and wells is 4-6, and surface water and groundwater quality is 5-8, and drinking water distribution and treatment is 6-9 questions, with wastewater collection and treatment at 7-11. Those bands separate pipes, pumps, channels, storms, wells, stream quality, and plant processes.

PE Environmental places drinking water, wastewater, stormwater, and the supporting flow and science topics inside Water, at 19-29 questions, while solid and hazardous waste, sustainability, air, site assessment and remediation, and environmental and occupational health each have their own ranges. The FE Environmental exam is an earlier exam with its own outline. Use the April 2026 PE ranges when you choose practice for this test.

Frequently asked questions

How many questions are on the PE Environmental exam?

The exam has 80 questions and 8 hours of exam time, which is 6 minutes per question on average. The appointment is 9 hours. That window also includes a 2-minute nondisclosure agreement, an 8-minute tutorial, and a 50-minute scheduled break.

What changed in the PE Environmental exam in 2026?

Beginning April 2026, the exam is given to the current PE Environmental specification. That specification is closed book, uses SI and U.S. Customary units, and sets the six question ranges in the table on this page. The electronic reference for it is the PE Environmental Reference Handbook 2.0, first posted in October 2025.

What is the PE Environmental pass rate?

In the NCEES results last updated in July 2026, 73% of 415 first-time examinees passed, and 54% of 118 repeat examinees passed. The two groups are reported separately. Check NCEES again if you need a figure newer than that update.

Is PE Environmental the same as PE Civil water resources?

They are different exams. PE Environmental follows the April 2026 specification, with water, solid and hazardous waste, sustainability, air, site assessment and remediation, and environmental and occupational health, and the Examinee Guide table lists no design standards for it. PE Civil Water Resources and Environmental follows an April 2024 specification with twelve areas, including soils, hydraulics, hydrology, treatment, and sitework, and PE Civil uses design standards.

Which reference is provided on the PE Environmental exam?

You use the electronic PE Environmental Reference Handbook, version 2.0, a 222-page PDF that NCEES first posted in October 2025. The exam is closed book, and the Examinee Guide table lists no design standards for PE Environmental.

Sources

1. NCEES: PE Environmental exam. Retrieved October 3, 2026.
2. NCEES PE Environmental exam specifications, effective April 2026 (PDF). Retrieved October 3, 2026.
3. NCEES Examinee Guide, May 2026 (PDF). Retrieved October 3, 2026.
4. NCEES: PE exam. Retrieved October 3, 2026.
5. NCEES PE Environmental Reference Handbook 2.0 (PDF in MyNCEES). Retrieved October 3, 2026.